To Love Yourself
by Deezley
Summary: I may have loved him, but I loved myself more - RonDraco


" I don't believe you!" Ron shouted, his face turning red with rage.

"Keep it down," I commanded. I was positive the neighbors would wake, and I had no desire to explain the current situation.

"I will not 'keep it down'," Ron replied, his face going into a defiant grimace. "You're unbelievable. How can you come home to me, night after night, and continue on with this? Why are you there? What are you doing?" Ron was livid, and I was beginning to tune him out. It got so repetitive to listen to him bitch and moan like this. Couldn't we just fuck and forget? Distractedly I began focusing on the way his face only seemed to get redder and redder, and looked as though it were about to burst. I snickered at the thought. "Think this is funny, do you?!" Ron roared.

"Look," I said, trying to remain calm. "Don't worry about it Ron. I'm not going to murder you- just yet."

Ron scoffed. Where did he get off scoffing? Scoffing was a privilege reserved solely for me. "You're a Death Eater, Draco! I work for Dumbledore! We can't go on like this!" I was beginning to feel angry now.

"Weasley, it's really none of your concern. And keep your sodding voice down. I should never have told you."

"You didn't think I'd notice? There's a huge black skull burned into your arm, Malfoy. It's pretty apparent." I glared. Well, I could have hidden it, if I'd really wanted to. That would just have meant we'd have to fuck in the dark. Or, not fuck at all.

"Weasley," I said, arching an eyebrow, and grabbing at Ron's tie. "Let's just put this all behind us. I wont say anything about your," I swallowed thickly, "career, and you won't say anything about mine." I began to undo Ron's tie, slipping the silk material out from its knot, and letting it fall to the ground. I kissed his throat, and felt his Adam's apple bob in response. The red head let a small puff of air come from his mouth.

"Draco," Ron said softly. "You can't always do this."

"Do what?" I replied, as I kissed at his neck. I was undoing the buttons in Ron's shirt, when his long hands clasped over mine.

"This! You can't just fuck me and think that everything's okay."

I grumbled in response. "Why not? Ron it's simple. This is me, this is you. I can't give up who I am, and neither can you. Maybe you think I'm something, or someone with a conscious, but I'm not. I am a Malfoy, and I have a responsibility. Jesus, Weasley, we had an agreement about this."

"I just can't believe that."

"Can't believe what?"

Ron looked desperately at me, as though trying to make me psychically guess what it was he couldn't believe. "I can't believe that you like being a Death Eater."

"I don't have to like it Ron!" I bellowed, finally tiring of this stupid game. "It's just what I do! This is who I am."

"It isn't. I can't believe that. Why would you be with me at all if you believed all of that bullshit?"

"I could ask the same of you, Weasley."

Ron stood there for a moment, silent, and apparently baffled, before finally licking his lips and speaking. "Maybe, maybe you shouldn't come here anymore than." Ron looked down at his feet, and wiggled his toes inside his shoes. He did that when he got self-conscious.

"No," I said in disbelief. "NO! Fuck you Weasel! You don't end this, I do! And I say it's not over yet!"

Ron looked up from his feet. "You're not my keeper Draco. If I don't want you to come over anymore, than you wont. So get out."

I stared at the red head in a confusing combination of loathing, and pure shock. Now the little prick was telling _me _to leave? Right this moment? It was absurd.

"I'm not leaving," I scoffed. "Just try and make me Weasel."

"Don't tempt me. It's my house, GET OUT!" Ron said, now furiously grabbing a ceramic ferret off the mantle.

"You don't have the guts," I said as he pulled his arm back in preparation for throwing.

"Watch me," and with a burst of power, the ceramic ferret flew through the air, barely missing my head as I ducked. I snarled and crouched on the floor. I looked under the table where I was hiding and saw one of Ron's old, holey shoes. The boy went through shoes in what seemed like a number of days. No wonder his parents were so poor. I picked up said shoe, and threw it with all my force at the furious red head. He jumped out of the way as the shoe flew into the fire.

"That was my shoe!" Ron screeched, looking slack jawed into the fireplace.

"It was ugly anyways," I said, crossing my arms casually over my chest. Without so much as a breath of air, Ron launched on top of me, and I gave way, my head slamming onto the hardwood floor. "I'll. Bloody. Kill. You," Ron roared in between punches to my stomach. Apparently he'd had been saving this up for a while, because he was absolutely furious.

"Get off me you Neanderthal!" I tried to say, but found it incredibly hard as Weasley was now snogging me senseless. They boy turned so quickly, that I was still completely out of breath from the punches. His lips parted from mine, and he quickly licked his lips.

"You're such a fuck," he said moodily, as he continued to straddle me.

"You know you love me," I said before I could stop myself. I don't know what I was thinking we **never **brought up love. Ron's blushed, and turned his head away from me, looking into the fireplace.

"I really liked that shoe you know."

"I know," I replied. "But, I was saving you Ron. Trust me. Why don't you let me buy you a new pair?" It's not as though I was doing this to be nice, I just thought he could use a new pair of shoes. It was almost embarrassing to watch him leave the house in those. I would have bought him anything he wanted, if he'd wanted it.

"Don't try and buy me off! I don't want your dirty Death Eater money." He got off of me, finally, and I lay back, staring up at the ceiling. "What am I going to do?" He asked. I had no idea if he wanted me to answer, or if he was talking to himself. Positively batty to talk to yourself, so I figured he wanted an answer.

"Why don't we just go to bed?" I asked, hoping he'd want to finish what he'd started. Not the fighting, the snogging, unless he wanted to fight in bed, which wasn't really uncommon. He sat down on the floor next to me, and I looked over to him. I grabbed him again by his shirt, and pulled him toward me. He kissed me, softly, and more close to sweetly then I think we'd ever kissed before. He laid his head down on my chest, and played idly with the belt loops in my trousers.

This struck me as incredibly odd. We were laying on the painfully hard floors in the living room, and I felt fine with it. We'd never really had a moment like this. Our relationship was based purely on sex and violence. We worked so well that way, and now here he was being vulnerable lying on my chest. I listened to him breathe for a long while before finally breaking the calm silence.

"Ron."

"Yeah," he replied in his monotone voice, which meant, 'I'm depressed.'

"What, what," this was harder to say than I thought. "What do you want me to do?"

"Nothing," he said, his voice still devoid of any emotion. His hands were still ceaselessly moving near my waist, and I knew he had something to say. It was maybe the first time I was ready to listen.

"Tell me Weasel, this is the only chance you've got."

"What's that mean?"

"It means I'm feeling just stupid enough to listen. I might regain consciousness any moment now, so say it fast."

"Lucky me," he said. I looked at him, raising a solitary eyebrow. I knew I was probably doing the wrong thing, but he must have put some sort of spell on me, I actually wanted to fix this situation. "I just, I don't want to, eh, you know…"

"What?" I asked impatiently.

"I don't want you to… to…to die."

"Gee, Weasley, I think that's the nicest thing anyone's ever said to me." He slapped my stomach in response. But kept his head pressed firmly to my chest.

"I don't want you to be a Death Eater. I don't want you to die!" He straddled me again, looking into my eyes. I couldn't stand it. Things were never supposed to get like this with us. We'd always had an agreement. He'd marry Granger (if she lived that long) one day, and I'd marry Pansy. We'd have kids; our kids would go to Hogwarts together and be mortal enemies. And we'd meet on weekend for a quick shag. Unless one of us got someone better, in which case all bets were off. But now, it felt so fucking different. I couldn't just not be a Death Eater for Weasley.

"I'll die if I leave the Death Eaters," I replied looking away from Ron's piercing eyes. Who did he think I was? I wasn't one of his do-gooder friends, I had responsibilities, I had things I had to live up to.

"What about Snape? He was a Death Eater, and he's still alive." 'Not for long,' I thought. Lucius had been plotting against Snape since the tri-wizard tournament.

"Well what do you want me to do Weasley?"

"I want you to quit the Death Eaters. I want you to move in with me. I want to be with you. I, I love you."

I swallowed, and looked over at the fireplace again. The shoe was now nothing but a pile of ashes. He loved me. He loved me. He loved me. I turned my eyes toward him, looking at his angelic face floating inches from mine, feeling the weight of his warm body pressed against me. I didn't ever want it to change. I wished, for the first time in my life, that I wasn't a Death Eater. I wished that I could be like Ron. And truthfully, I loved him. I loved him more than can ever be explained.

I raised my head to his, and kissed him passionately, my tongue gaining entrance into the hot confines of his mouth. He tasted so beautiful, I wanted to live inside that warm, moist kiss. He lightly bit my bottom lip as I drew away. "I love you too." He pushed his mouth against mine, and whimpered into it.

"Let's go to bed," I said pulling away again. He nodded, bit his lip, pecked me once more and stood up. I walked with him to his room, and watched as he took off his clothes and got into bed. I smiled as he looked at me with hooded eyes. I wanted to remember him just like that. I walked over to him, and pulled the sheets over his beautiful freckled body. I tucked the blankets around him, the way my father had done for me when I was a child. I sat down next to him on the bed, and cupped his face in my hands. He was so beautiful. "I love you," I said again, feeling much more confident in those words. I kissed him lightly on the lips, and got up. He smiled at me, and gave me a "come hither" look.

"Goodbye Weasley," I said as I turned off the lights in his room, and apparated out of the house. I may have loved him, but I loved myself more.


End file.
